Rough year for the concert industry

Man, it's been a difficult year for concert promoters and the like.

There have been any number of shows canceled recently, or plans for future editions of a concert series have been killed. Most of the shows were canceled due to one reason.

Soft ticket sales.

That can happen when promoters and/or venues are paying six figures or even seven figures for their headliners. The ticket price has to go up accordingly.

We've gotten some ridicule the past four years as to why we haven't tried to sign George Strait as the headliner for the Real. Texas. Festival. After all, he is certainly in the conversation for being the most famous Texas recording artist out there.

And, we could book George Strait. It only takes money ... high six figures if not seven figures. If we book George Strait, the $15 ticket price goes out the door. It would have be to be triple that ... if not more to attend the festival.

Also, say good-bye free general admission or shuttle lot parking, kids 12-and-under- free, complimentary rodeo admission -- and we'd probably have to find some other things that we could charge admission or user fees.

We'd prefer to properly manage our entertainment cost to keep the ticket price affordable and all-inclusive.

R&B megastar Rhiannon canceled a few shows this summer because of soft ticket sales. The economy isn't quite there yet. And, by and large, I think fans just simply don't want to pay $200 and $300 per ticket to see their favorite artists.

I don't know ... maybe it's Ke$ha. Ke$ha was on the bill with Rhianon for some of those canceled shows. She was also supposed to perform in the South Side Seaport concert series in New York. It was canceled as well.

Note to artists ... avoid performing dates with Ke$ha.

In fairness to Ke$ha, the Seaport concert series was canceled due to mistaken expectations. It was thought 6,000 or so would show up for the free Drake concert. However, 25,000 attended and the security wasn't able to adequately manage crowd control. So, the organizers of the series simply pulled the plug on it ... it was a free concert series so they weren't making money. Plus, they had to deal with the public relations black eye.

Soft ticket sales also doomed Hullabalou at Churchill Downs in Louisville, Kent. The first year show was decimated by the heat and the fact they just couldn't sell enough of the $300-plus tickets. The promoters lost $5 million on the shows, twice as much as they planned on losing in the first year.

Promoters have already said there won't be a second Hullabalou ... at least not next year. It was the perfect storm of a huge entertainment nut to cover, weather and economic conditions.

I dare say Hullabalou had close to $5 million tied up in three artists -- Kenny Chesney, Dave Matthews Band and Bon Jovi. The event also featured Zac Brown Band, The Doobie Brothers, Sara Evans, Jason Aldean, Steve Miller Band and the Black Crowes.

Even though soft ticket sales has been the culprit for many concert cancellations, there have been other reasons.

We already mentioned the crowd control issues for South Street Seaport. In 2009, Fort Worth's May Fest was canceled because of what was perceived as a huge health scare -- the Swine Flu "epidemic."

The Glastonberry Music Festival in England will be canceled for 2012 ... two years away. Soft ticket sales aren't to blame for this one. After all, how can someone predict how many ticket are or are not going to be sold two years from now?

No, a portable toilet shortage is cited as the reason the festival will be canceled. The Olympic games come to London in 2012 and all available portable toilets will be deployed for that spectacle.

That just stinks for Glastonberry. Ooops ... sorry. Bad pun.